Link: Late Day & Digital?

Newsarama have some interesting thoughts to go with Brian Bendis’s comment on the lateness of the final part of ‘The Death Of Spider-Man’ digitally:

Something leapt out at me fromÂ this interview with Brian Michael Bendis talking about the Death of Spider-Man. Namely, the part where he talked about retailersâ€™ benefiting from the success of the death issue:

“A lot of my friends who own stores are hurting, and being able to help out and give them a good day made me feel good; that was really important to me. Issue #160 wasnâ€™t available digitally, so you had to go buy it. By the time you read this it should be available digitally, but today it wasnâ€™t. So my retailing buddies were emailing me and saying there were some really quick sell-outs and some extra foot traffic in stores. That was great to hear.”

Great to hear unless youâ€™re Marvel Comics, of course. Because, you see,Â Ultimate Spider-Man #160Â should have been available digitally. MarvelÂ announced late last year that â€œevery issue of the hotly-anticipated DEATH OF SPIDER-MAN will be available day & date on the Marvel Comics app, available via iTunes for the iPad, iPhone & iPod touch,â€ after all, and so having the writer of your top-selling book give interviews where he not only points out that that didnâ€™t happen, but tries to paint it as a positiveâ€¦ Well, thatâ€™s got to hurt.

I wondered if Marvel had actually rolled back the day-and-date delivery promise at some point quietly because ofÂ earlier problems getting digital releases out on time (Read on through that thread; Jonathan Hickman says that the problem withUltimate Thorâ€˜s late release â€“ #3 was three weeks late â€“ was between ComiXology and Apple, and on Appleâ€™s side), and so checked with Marvel, only to be told that, no,Â Death of Spider-Man was all day-and-date release digitally. Except, you know, when it isnâ€™t.

Wonder if DC has worked out all of these kinks before their September relaunchâ€¦?